AUDIO CLIPS
Barriers are still zoning, single family zoning, so I get how important this affordability is here, I don’t think that high rises work in the town of Ann Arbor because we are an island. There’s not a single fire fighter that works for the city of Ann Arbor that lives in the city limits, and I do not believe that there is a police officer who lives in the city limits. Very little designated affordable housing. And I see it getting significantly worse unless we can find a way to get in front of it and solve it to scale.
OLIVIA
Hey guys it’s Olivia, and for this episode of Michigan Voices I say down with fellow University of Michigan senior Lindsay Calka. Besides for being my favorite barista, Lindsay is president of Michigan Movement, a student run organization working to fight homelessness in Ann Arbor.
LINDSAY
My name is Lindsay Calka, and I am a senior at the university of Michigan and the college literature science and the arts studying social theory and practice and a minor in urban studies.
OLIVIA
I know that the affordable housing crisis in Ann Arbor’s about a huge problem. And I don’t think that it’s, um, noticed enough that people in Ann Arbor, but can you explain the history of the affordable housing crisis a little bit?
LINDSAY
Yeah. The university of Michigan has had a very negative impact on the housing market in the city of Ann Arbor. Um, you could also leave in relationship to insulate Indians housing crisis because I think that’s where it’s felt. Um, maybe this, because a lot of folks are pushed out of Ann arbor into Yipsy. So then you see, you know, trickle effects into other surrounding areas. Um, but basically I would say perhaps in the last 10 years, that might be a little bit larger or like a bigger time frames and drew drew impact.
LINDSAY
That’s maybe been five years, but I think you could probably track recent of it for the past 10 years, but, um, yeah, university has been attracting big or tech companies in the city of Ann Arbor. Um, generally raising cost of living housing transportation. The university itself has refused to build housing in the past. I think the last place they built was actually, um, the graduate student dorm window. I forget the name of, uh, but it’s like the boujee one that’s for grad students.
LINDSAY
And that’s the last housing that was built for students. So ever since then, they’ve just been uptaking enrollment and not building any housing. So all of the rich out of state students that come through the university just filter in.
OLIVIA
Knowledge on this topic really shows your passion. And I’m just wondering how you sparked this passion for this problem.
LINDSAY
Yeah. That’s a good question. People have asked you that recently because I am kind of in like, in a lot of different spaces. And so people are like, what’s, what’s your deal? Like, why do you do this? Um, but basically it comes from just a place of, um, okay. I started volunteering at opens bumper Cialis when I was a freshman in undergrad at the university. And that place is a hospitality house for individuals experiencing homelessness because I joined a student or con Michigan movement, which works in the same space in the same community.
LINDSAY
And that was just one of our main volunteers sense. Um, I joined that org because I just wanted to have byproduct volunteering. I didn’t want to be a lame, um, typical volunteer in college where you like do fundraisers or just like things that are very removed from the community. So mercy house was like the singular place where it was like, this feels like I’m really a part of the, like the Harbor community.
LINDSAY
No one really knows that I’m a student. I can just like, um, and being in community with people and it’s not a removed like soup kitchen where, you know, you’re, you’re serving in, there’s a clear divide between, you know, who’s receiving the aid and who is giving it. Um, and so I just wanted to be in that space. And after being there for a while, I just, you know, having a lot of great friendships with people who are experiencing homelessness and kind of drew to prioritize as that is like the biggest thing that I wanted to put my time to energy and to eating ever since then, um, I’ve kind of like shifted my academic studies into that space.
LINDSAY
And I have been really, really interested in urban studies and, um, the political economy of cities and how all of this is happens, how homelessness is just something that is a market function.
LINDSAY
That’s not really, um, I mean, obviously it’s not a natural occurrence, but it’s something very inherent to capitalism and yeah, I, the right to housing is something that I think is one of the most important rights that are denied in American society. It’s in other places, um, it’s denied as well, but it is a huge, huge, huge problem in American cities. And, um, yeah, it was something that I was just tired of being uncomfortable with and didn’t guilty about. So, um, and my friends were having to experience it. And so I just started to figure out different ways to help it.
OLIVIA
You have done a great job of getting your voice out there and showing this problem to your papers. Do you think that the city of Ann Arbor is now noticing it just as much as us.
LINDSAY
Yeah. Um, so are like the, the organization that I’m in that does a lot of, um, protests and demos has like, uh, a specific strategy and that’s on, you know, direct action towards state and taking and doing the things that they’re supposed to be doing or what we expect to do. And so, um, although it’s important to like raise general attention, all of that stuff is kind of just like a positive side effect in garnering more people and more activity to mobilize against taking direct action.
So the things that we do is, um, it’s made to put pressure on people who make decisions and control budgets to, um, give your money into the shelter system. You have more money to build affordable housing and do certain things stop policing with camps. And like all of these specific things that are, you know, strings pulled by elected officials.
Um, and you know, they do, they, they feel the pressure. It’s kind of funny because Anarbor has, um, you know, everyone is very, very liberal and is even if they’re fiscally conservative, socially liberal and they feel guilty, would we do this and stuff? Um, and so like the past experience I had last semester, um, we had a huge, huge campaign or like demo to have them keep open. One of the emergency shelters, they were closing down and like they were, yeah, they came at us and they would invite us to meetings and like constantly loop us in, into the conversations that we’re having in order to like, get us to shut up, which was like a nice, like, it was nice.
Pre-Filled what we were doing was working. Um, however they, you know, it still wasn’t the result we wanted. They were like bringing us into the conversation so that we could solve their problems or we would, you know, workshop what they should do to figure out where the money should come from.
Um, something that we were really happy with it because it’s, you know, it’s on, it’s on our jobs to do that. There’s a surcharge, we just telling them to make it work, you know? So, um, but definitely in Ann Arbor people respond because they don’t want to look bad because it’s, it’s funny, you know, like, I mean, no one wants to be the person that’s mean to someone who’s homeless like that. It’s very easy to frame it in a way to make someone look really, really bad. Um, and like I have bad morals and everyone freaks out about it when we do so it’s thankfully like a cause that is so, so logical.
It’s like, duh, like, why wouldn’t we do this? Why wouldn’t we give people shelter to pandemic? Um, but when it comes time to, you know, giving the money over to do it or making the decisions to sustain those things, that’s where it gets a little tricky. But, um, yeah, the, the mass media shaming is very easy to do and pretty effective.
OLIVIA
Speaking of mass media. I recently read an article about the statue outside of the UMMA. I think it is called “Do You See Us?”
LINDSAY
And this article, like I kind of read about the problems with the homelessness during the pandemic and the closing of the red roofing. Um, can you kind of explain what went on during this time and what the significance of that?
Um, so that was something that was started in October. So that’s the beginning of October, the shelter association, which is run by the County, made the announcement that they were going to be closing or like emptying out that shelter by October 31st. Um, this was something that was in a program that was started in, I think it was either April or may to give like isolated shelter to, um, hosts at the shelter.
So was doing isolated shelter, but obviously when you can, everyone needs their own space. There’s way less capacity. So everyone who was like, kind of the overhaul would go to the red roof Inn and have their own hotel room. And it was something, you know, very effective and giving people their own space to keep you safe. Also having shelter, everyone had their own room with running water showers. So it was just like the perfect anecdote and the falling people were using the motel anyway, because it was very dependent mix.
So, um, a lot of cities around the U S did that and kept them open and still have them open. However, in October in Arbor or a wash County was like, we’re going to close ours because we don’t really need it anymore. And there’s also the, the sideline of, um, the hotel or the motel was being bulldozed to have this like fancy youth, like Hampton or something when a Panera was going to be put on the property. So like really stupid reasons. Um, and so whatever the group that I’m in, I watch my camp outreach. We just, um, we were doing mutual aid stuff with people who are camping at the time.
And obviously by October it was getting colder. So a lot of the people were organizing and, and when were staying at red roof until we basically just started having barbecues at red roof in just in the, like the outdoor area to talk about like what to do with whether or not we want to occupy the motel, or if we wanted to, you know, demand other things.
And the consensus that we can to was at least like having some sort of demonstration there, um, to demand that they keep it open. And a lot of people weren’t comfortable with occupying it, but wanting to kind of like raise a stink and say like, we don’t want this to happen. And we think it’s a stupid idea and we’re going to at least like, you know, do whatever we can do to make you release the funding so we can keep it open a little bit longer or secure some sort of other 24 hour isolated shelter. Um, and yeah, after we, that was all in October and they were just like, ever since that closure, there’s been a huge, just like community.
So core of like the, at shelters closed and nothing was replaced. So like, we still need more shelter, where’s it going to come from where other versions of this or this like type of configuration.
And a lot of people looked to the dorms that arms are just like hotel rooms. You know, you have your isolated small space. There’s a lot of them, but they cause a lot of people there’s bathrooms, showers. Um, and so we started pressuring you, um, to open the empty dorms because they closed down, um, campus and some people home early in November, so that the do you see as article kind of came in response to that of, you know, talked to him, you knew of them and like all of their lovely, um, virtual signaling and, um, all of that bullshit that they like to promote and being leaders and best at then, you know, that, that sculpture was just kind of like a, a fixture of like them literally closing your eyes to the whole community, um, shutting out the things that they were causing and also refusing to help with.
Um, and that fight was something like last November, like responded saying like, this is not something that we all have are responsible for. We have nothing to do with it. Therefore we don’t need to, um, you know, contribute at all. Or like, it’s just that our problem. And a lot of the County and the city are like, please meet with us to like, have a conversation about it. So they took a step in the right direction, but U of M was a force to be reckoned with. And they, they ha accountable to very little, um, even in terms of like shaming, like it’s so popular, everyone loves it that like when campus culture is like very anti, but that’s just kind of like the nature of what it is.
We are like a very activist, strong activist space. And so it’s hard to face anybody was shaming. Um, yeah, so that kind of just ended and was never officially the dorms whenever used for shelter. Um, and the, the County had to pick up the Slack.
OLIVIA
Yeah. Shameless plug. I took out the Do You See Us statue at the UMMA Um, so then to what comes next? Why are you working on that? Um, so.
LINDSAY
Personally, what we’re working on with camp or you turned out is we have a demo on next week actually on defending with this podcast is relationships show up, but we are working towards demanding a community land trust from the city. So I’m kind of shifting away from U of M and more back onto like just the city and Arbor is super guilty. And in this housing crisis as well, you know, you haven’t had a huge force in it, but in our bird does too. Like even though you might be attracting some people, um, in our bird self is gentrifying very quickly.
And our like weapon officials have an obligation to make decisions, to, you know, prevent this placement and, you know, make this development of equitable as possible. And they’re not doing that. Um, and personally, and the ideology of our group is anticapitalist. And at the very least, if you’re not integrated all over the board, um, you know, antiques or having deep commodifying housing is kind of whether you call it a trend or kind of like rising popularity of understanding that housing is so expensive and is so, um, the vulnerable to like the aggressive capital’s market because it’s commodified.
And so we’re, um, at least a huge chunk of holiday from the private market is a step in the right direction of getting affordable housing because although the city can honor that it has affordable housing, that’s a calculation that they turn and they’ll say, Oh, it’s 30% of this annual median income. But the annual median income is calculated off. Not by including people who are not working. You’re not including people who are working less than minimum wage. Um, so the annual meeting of income of Ann Arbor is way we, we, we not aligned with what something is actually affordable for someone who works a minimum wage job or works in food service or work somewhere else.
That’s not in, you know, whatever, more lucrative job. So, um, we’re aiming for community land trust, which would be housing that is, um, would be pulled. We want the city to make a conglomerate of this community land trust from vacant properties that the city already owns. Convert the ownership to community land trust so the properties would not be subject to market prices, they would be determined by what is actually affordable to the area and they would be governed by the community who lives in them. Instead of property owners who may live in New York or just want to make money, who have nothing to do with Ann Arbor.
An so, generally what I think is next, from the inside out is tearing down, like removing capitalism from housing. If we are going to get on board with housing being a human right and something that we should be entitled to no matter who you are, or what you do, or if you work or you don’t, if you have an addiction or not. It needs to be a public good and I think it’s going to be a very hard fight, we aren’t going to get there this year.
OLIVIA
I’m pretty proud of you for taking a role on this kind of stuff, it’s pretty rare to see a student do that. Thanks Lindsay, and once again this is Olivia Peterson with Michigan voices. I encourage everyone to check out Michigan movement and Washtenaw camp outreach, they both have great information on their websites. Additionally, feel free to reach out to Lindsay at lacalka@umich.edu, she would love to chat with anyone interested in learning more about these issues!
FIGHT SONG
